“That’s what I say sometimes. Granny won’t have it. She’s all for hereditary ill-luck, as if we are to suffer for what was done a hundred years ago. I don’t believe it, for my part. Do you?” He thought of his talk with Constance in the country road. “It is a dreadful question; do not let it trouble us. Let us go on with our work and not think about it.” “It’s all very well to say ‘Don’t think about it,’ when she talks about nothing else, especially when she looks at Sam and thinks of you. There was something else I wanted to say.” She dropped her head, and began nervously to twitch with her fingertips. “I’m almost ashamed to say it. Sam would never forgive me, but I think of granny first and of all she has endured, and I must warn you.” She looked round; there was nobody else present. “It’s about Sam, my brother. I must warn you--I must, because he may make mischief between you and granny.” “He will find that difficult. Well, go on.” “He goes to your village in the country. He sits and talks with the people. He pretends that he goes to see how the old man is getting on. But it is really to find out all he can about the property.” “What has he to do with the property?” “He wants to find out what is to become of all the money.” “Does he think that the rustics can tell him?” “I don’t know. You see, his head is filled with the hope of getting some of the money. He wants to get it divided among the heirs. It’s what he calls the ‘accumulations.’” “Accumulations!” Leonard repeated impatiently. “They are all in a tale. I know nothing about these accumulations, or what will be done with them.” “Sam is full of suspicions. He thinks there is a conspiracy to keep him out.” “Oh, does he? Well, tell him that my great-grandfather’s solicitor receives the rents and deals with them as he is instructed. I, for one, am not consulted.” “I said you knew nothing about it. Granny was so angry. You see, Sam can think of nothing else. He’s been unlucky lately, and he comforts himself with calculating what the money comes to. He’s made me do sums--oh! scores of sums--in compound interest for him: Sam never got so far himself. If you’ve never worked it out----” “I never have. Like Sam, I have not got so far.” “Well, it really comes to a most wonderful sum. Sometimes I think that the rule must be wrong. It mounts up to about a million and a half.” “Does it?” Leonard replied carelessly. “Let your brother understand, if you can, that he builds his hopes on a very doubtful succession.” “Half of it he expects to get. Granny and you, he says, are the only heirs. What is hers, he says, is his. So he has made her sign a paper giving him all her share.” “Oh! And where do you come in?” “There will be nothing for me, because it will all be granny’s: and she has signed that paper, so that it is to be all his.” “I am sorry that she has signed anything, though I do not suppose such a document would stand.”